


navigate these crooked paths

by forcynics



Series: holiday fic 2011 [2]
Category: The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-02
Updated: 2011-12-02
Packaged: 2018-05-24 04:29:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6141505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forcynics/pseuds/forcynics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It doesn't count as killing someone if you know they're going to come right back to life. (Damon's never been good at apologies).</p>
            </blockquote>





	navigate these crooked paths

 

 

 

It doesn't count as killing someone if you know they're going to come right back to life.

So Damon tells himself - and anyone else who will or won't listen - over and over. Besides, it's not like he left the guy lying there on the lawn. He brought Ric back to the boardinghouse, dumped him (albeit rather unceremoniously) on the couch, and made the guy a drink for when he woke up.

And honestly, he thought that would be enough. He just _acts_ sometimes - _snaps_ \- but Ric knows that. And he knew that Ric was wearing a ring. So. Not a big deal.

He sat there in the armchair, gnawing his lip, waiting for some sign of life in his friend, telling himself he wasn't nervous, and maybe there was a part of him that wondered whether or not he could have handled the situation differently, but he ignored it because then Ric _was_ waking up, eyes opening all startled.

And okay, he was _not_ expecting to be stormed off on just like that, bites back a line about Ric being about as dramatic as a teenage girl.

The guy didn't even touch his drink. Which was kind of supposed to convey the _sorry_ that Damon can't quite push past his teeth.

 

*

 

"Ric still pissed at me?"

Elena rolls her eyes, tilts her head at him like she always does when she's about bestow _important information_ on him that she thinks he should already know.

"You killed him!"

Damon's the one rolling his eyes now, a groan slipping out. "Why is _everyone_ so hung up on that?"

Elena makes a choked noise, widens her eyes purposefully at him.

"We all knew he was gonna be fine," he grumbles.

"Have you apologized?"

He stares at her, brow furrowing. "No, _Elena_ , I have not _apologized._ And I won't," he snipes, ignores how childish he sounds even to himself.

She shrugs, casual of all the sudden, and smiles sweetly at him. "Then I guess you'll just have to find yourself a new friend. You're good at that, right?"

He makes a face, but fuck, he does not like either of those options. Weighs them against each other as he drives over. (But really, it's not all that hard to decide.)

 

 *

 

The thing is, Ric and him never should have been friends in the first place.

He slept with the other guy’s wife, turned her into a vampire, and then oh yeah, he killed Ric before too, when he first showed up in town all mysterious.

And Damon may not be the most experienced with these things but he’s pretty sure none of those things are typical foundations for a friendship. But you know, he cut the guy some slack, didn’t kill him again, eventually laid off on the snide taunts about Isobel, and was, well… nicer than he had to be.

The way he sees it, the fact that they ever became friends was pretty much a gigantic apology in itself. But he can’t decide if that makes it all sound insincere or just sounds plain sappy, so he tucks the thought away and vows to never voice it out loud.

Either way, he’s been _sorry_ enough times in the past, he just always figured Ric was smart enough to get it without needing to _hear_ it. Again, he has to hold back from telling him he’s acting like a teenage girl.

Figures it probably wouldn’t earn him any brownie points right now.

 

*

 

He’s pretty sure that if he waits long enough, Ric will cave. He’s halfway to asking Elena what she thinks about the likelihood of that, if she thinks Ric misses him, when he realizes how pathetic that’ll make _him_ look and bites his tongue.

She did have a point, though, about him being not so great in the friends department.

So maybe he does miss Ric. Maybe enough that he contemplates just coming out and apologizing for the whole killing him thing.

But when he tries, it comes out as “Wanna grab a drink?” instead, eyebrows raised and a forced casualness to his tone, as if Ric isn’t mad and Damon never killed him and they’ll just head down to the Grill like they used to, joke about being half that place’s business as the town’s resident alcoholics.

Ric looks at him like he’s crazy. “With the guy who killed me?” He snorts. “Not particularly, no.”

And alright, this is getting ridiculous by now. _Ric_ is getting ridiculous by now, and Damon’s about to tell him that but the guy’s already turning away and walking off, and he’s not going to yell after him or chase him down because really, he’s not _that_ desperate.

Even if he does try to think of other ways to not-quite-apologize – ones that might actually work - while he walks home.

 

*

 

His apology to Mason Lockwood is half-assed at best, and he’s not surprised when Ric calls him out for trying to reuse it, even if he does kind of want to grab the guy by the shoulders and shake him until he gets it.

He grins instead, lowers his eyelids and makes assurances that he didn’t _mean_ it with Mason, and even if he still hasn’t technically apologized – to either of them – the message seems to sink in.

So he winks, throws an arm over Ric’s shoulder as he leads him down the tunnel to the point where he can go no further, and tells himself that if he feels lighter inside as he watches the other guy go off, it’s probably just because now Elena and everyone else can stop sniping at him.

If she asks, he’ll tell her that he did apologize.

Because he did. Basically.

And really, their friendship – whatever it is – makes little enough sense as it is, without Damon throwing uncharacteristic apologies into the mix.

But Ric gets it.

 

 

 


End file.
